To survive in the information age, businesses and organizations require useful information about their organizations, markets, and operations. Useful business information is usually a condensed collection of data that is easy to understand and easy to absorb. To create useful information, businesses and organizations generally acquire vast collections of data that come from numerous and disparate sources then condense and organize the data into more useful forms and formats. Businesses and organizations usually rely on software packages to condense, manipulate, or formulate the data into useful information. The software packages make the manipulation of the vast data collections possible and efficient. One of the most common software packages used to derive more useful information from data collections is the spreadsheet application, such as the Microsoft® Excel spreadsheet application offered by Microsoft® Corporation.
Some spreadsheet applications allow some manipulation of data using database operations. Database operations, such as sort or filter, allow the user to format, condense, or organize data within a spreadsheet. Within spreadsheet applications, such as the Microsoft® Excel spreadsheet application, the database operations are only available to the user as a one-time operation. The database operation is generally accessed through a drop down menu in the spreadsheet application. The menu selection generally opens an operation user interface to step the user through the process of using the database operation. Unfortunately, the user can employ the operations only once, and the user is given only a few options to change the way the database operations function. To repeat the database operation, the user must again select the operation from the menu and enter the options again. Thus, the database operations are generally not automatically repeatable and are not flexible.
These problems are exacerbated when the user is a large organization that wants to manipulate large collections of data that originate from several, disparate sources. Users who require complex, table-based, database operations in a spreadsheet application often turn to manually manipulating the data or creating macro code to prepare the data. The first option is often time-consuming, expensive, and error-prone because the solution requires manual intervention every time the data changes. To automate this process, a user could employ macrocode, such as that created by Visual Basic for Applications® program. Unfortunately, the syntax and organization of macrocode is difficult for most users of spreadsheet applications. The macrocode can also be difficult to maintain. Most users cannot decipher the actual code, and thus, users cannot correct errors and cannot adjust the solution in the future.
In addition, the users often introduce new data to the spreadsheet on a recurring or periodic basis. For instance, monthly sales data is incorporated into spreadsheet applications every month. The users must manipulate the data monthly to create the useful information about business performance during the past month. To accomplish the manipulation of the monthly data, the users must either use the numerous database operations every month, which is extremely time consuming and wasteful, use the manual operations mentioned above, which the user must often change to work with the new data, or create the macro code mentioned above that may work with a new set of data but is difficult to create.